Katie and I celebrated our 18th wedding anniversary last weekend and have been together for over 22 years. She’s awesome.
Our wedding day was a memorable one, especially for our Denver sports family, as the Colorado Avalanche won game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final about 300 yards away from the reception.
Earlier this week, a coworker asked if I had any insights or secrets to a long marriage. Well, since I mix pods, I rattled a few of the first things that came to mind.
So after having some more time to think about it, I thought I would share 18 lessons that I think have played a role in our marriage.
Disclaimer: I didn’t collaborate with Katie before posting this, so she’ll either be pleasantly surprised by my spontaneity, or I may have to append a lesson #19, check with your wife before posting 18 lessons from your marriage on the internet!
18 lessons that I learned from 18 years of marriage
Have things you do together, have things you do on your own
There are different stages of life you’ll go through together, embrace it
Don’t go to bed mad (this is one of Katie’s rules)
Embrace the in-laws (I married a whole family (and extended family))
Never take her perfect last bite (also known as the Katie bite)
Things work out better when you set expectations
Show gratitude
Balancing roles of mom, spouse, friend, career, daughter isn’t easy
Don’t always say the first thing that pops in your mind 🙂
Have mutual friends, have your own friends
Celebrate wins
Deliberately grow together
Buy an ear and nose hair trimmer
Go all in to support whatever it is she is passionate about
Work hard at staying engaged and being a good dad
Have a sense of humor and be able to laugh at yourself
Share your goals and dreams with each other
Go for long walks
But the key insight that I want you to take away from this blog is not the 18 things that I listed above, but to think about your own 1,2, 18, or 50 things that you learned from the relationship with your partner.
We were able to catch an Avalanche playoff game this year at the Pepsi Center. The last time they won the Cup was the evening that we tied the knot.
That was the question (which I already knew the answer), that I asked my wife Katie at Maggie’s pre-school continuation. Yep, our oldest is heading into kindergarten next year. And then, just as I started getting my head around that, a quick glance down in my lap and the realization that makes Addie the class of 2034!
Holy Moly!
So over the next 13-15 years, Katie and I, (along with many of you reading this blog) will be active in helping shape who these smart, fun, and energetic little ladies are today, into the women they will become.
It’s baffling to think how much they’ll learn between now and the time they graduate. Not just about the world around them, but in who they are deep inside and who they want to be their future.
Class of 2032! Currently wants to be a hair dresser, but is discovering her engineering talents
One thing for sure, the world will be a lot different. When my parents graduated high-school (1957 & 1958), Elvis Presley was at the top of the music charts, the average cost of a new house was $12,220.00, and a gallon of gas was 24 cents.
When Katie and I graduated (1995 & 1996), songs like TLC’s “Waterfalls”, Montell Jordon’s, “This is how we do it”, were topping the charts and the average cost of a new house was $113,150.00 and a gallon of gas was $1.09. (P.S. As many great memories I have from this time in my life, a quick google search will remind you it was just as politically charged as today and filled with many unfortunate and tumultuous world events.)
Future class of 2034. The class clown is so empathetic and caring, I’m sure will find herself in a compassion related career
By the time these girls are getting ready to graduate, they may not need to learn how to drive a car and they may talk to their friends telepathically. Who knows what the college landscape will look like by then? (an area I think it about to get majorly disrupted in the coming years). I hope they are fortunate to form the kind of lifelong friendships that Katie and I were able to during this time as well.
Although so many things in the world will change between now and then, there will be many things that will stay the same. There will still be laughter and joy, conflict and disagreements. There will be a need for leaders to emerge and rally others around important causes. There will be people that care and those that need to be cared for. There will always be a need for connection and the need to love and feel loved.
So I go back to an activity that I did in Daddy Boot Camp 5 years ago (yes, I went to that upon Katie’s strong recommendation). The activity was to write down two words that you want your kids to describe you with when they adults. Mine were engaged and supportive.
So over the next decade and a half, I think that if I stay the course with those two words and are engaged and supportive of the girls, they will be well positioned to celebrate their graduations and ready to explore their next steps based on their own unique and genuine world view.
Preschool continuation for Maggie in 2019! Watch out future, these girls are coming for you!
I really wasn’t good at coloring between the lines when I was a kid. I don’t know if it was an artistic skill thing or the ability to sit still long enough to focus on the art. Actually, I think it was a little bit of both.
Our girls provided a visual of my struggles at a diner in Glenwood Springs a couple of months ago. Maggie was focused and committed to coloring on the kid’s menu. However, Addie was too busy to sit still and wanted to stir up a little laughter.
While Maggie focused on the coloring, our mischievous Adeline was not to be tamed by a few crayons and a kids menu
Anyway, I’ve been feeling stretched a bit thin and not as focused lately. I think it is a combination of my commitments across multiple pods, my trouble sitting still, along with my serious FOMO issues.
I hear that setting clear boundaries is a good tool to prevent this from happening. However, you have probably picked up that as a guy that writes about mixing pods, I have challenges with boundaries.
My challenge with boundaries begins with a bit of overcommitment. I was on a project once and the lead said, “you would be surprised what we can get done in two weeks”. He was right, we got a ton done and all it took was 12-14 hour days and weekends. Without boundaries and enough time and resources, anything is possible.
I’m also willing to admit that my tendency to overcommit is self-imposed. I mean, saying no is easy, right?
I’m really good at saying no. Well sort of…
“No problem”
“No worries!”
“No, I got it”
“No, don’t worry about it”
“No, I didn’t do it yet, but I will”
I tend to commit to things with a ‘Ceteris Paribus’ mindset. You may remember this Latin phrase, meaning “all other things being equal” or “other things held constant” or “all else unchanged”. (Well, I actually didn’t remember it either. However, the concept always stuck with me, but I had to look up the Latin and I doubt I pronounce it correctly.)
Anyway, it’s the last definition that gets me in the most trouble because nothing in our life ever stays unchanged. So I’ll commit to something with just the lens of that activity, not factoring in my commitments across other areas, many of which are going to experience change, making them even more of a commitment.
So in writing this blog, I thought that someone must have written about this topic before. A quick google search and yep, lots of discussion on boundaries. (No surprise, a lot of posts on Oprah’s site). I came across this business blog by David Taylor. He actually has some pretty decent tips in his blog focused on productivity. (I couldn’t direct you to an Oprah site, my wife Katie would never stop teasing me).
However, the insight that has surfaced for me, is the need to figure out what the boundaries are before I make the initial commitment. To think through my existing commitments across each of the other pods and what I truly have the capacity to do. Otherwise, I’m just going to continue scrambling to follow through on what I said, “no”, to doing in the first place.
This doesn’t come easy to me. My friend Austin reminds me that I am not a squirrel. (Doing one thing at a time).
I think it surfaced while I was planning to celebrate another birthday this past week. (Plus, I’m pretty sure I haven’t watched any episodes of the Wonder Years on Nick at Nite.)
The song comes with great memories. Katie put it on a mixtape for me when she went to Indonesia for the summer in 1998 (yes, a mixtape). I wore the tape out listening to our handful of songs that had their own meaning and inside jokes. This one made it on the list because Katie knew early on how important close friendships were to me.
Anyway, I was super excited to get together with some of my closest friends that definitely provided me more than a little help over the years.
To hold me accountable to my core values
To make me run when I want to walk
To listen, but to call me out when it is just bitching and moaning
To help me dream about the future and ask, ‘why not?’
To reminisce about the past in order to strengthen our connection
To make the world feel smaller and my significance feel bigger
To make memories by thinking big or keeping it small
To keep me from taking myself too seriously
To serve as role models
To provide energy through laughter (at each other’s expense)
To remind me that I’m not a squirrel (a story for another blog)
But I think the most significant insight that has surfaced over the past couple of weeks is not how do I get by with a little help from my friends, but how do I focus on helping others get by, with a little help from me. I think I have room to grow by giving more to others.
I talked this through out loud last week when I was fortunate to be a guest on Candace’s Everyday Joy radio show. She asked, “If you could go back in time and share advice to the 20-year-old Tony, what would I tell myself ?” My response was to be more humble based on the realization over time that life gets more complex as you get older. I don’t know what fantasy land I was living in 1999, but for some reason, I don’t think I realized how much support I was going to need from friends and family over the past 20 years and now going forward.
This birthday served as a great reminder to thank those that help you get by and to think about how you help others along the way in their journey.
I remember the stories that my family would tell me about how much I would beg to stop at McDonald’s on our long road trips. As soon as I would see the McDonald’s sign, I would call out for a stop at ‘Nobody Cans’!
In 1979, McDonald’s ran an ad campaign with the slogan ‘Nobody can do it like McDonald’s can’. I guess my interest in adverting started at 2-years-old. It an easy connection to make. In a one-minute commercial, I think they say ‘nobody’ over 25 times. (see below)
When I was about 8-years-old, I used to walk around the house with a tape recorder hosting my version of a variety show. I would interview family members, describe random things around the house, and inevitably record the flushing of a toilet. (What 8-year-old boy would not think that was funny?) However, whenever I cut to a break, it was always a McDonald’s commercial that I made up. I would sing a jingle or recite the latest slogan. I actually think the commercials had the most content because they had a clear focus.
Well, my relationship with McDonald’s has continued into fatherhood. I will take the girls over every once in while on Saturday mornings while Katie runs her own errands.
You may be thinking ok, so what? The insight for me is recognizing how precious and meaningful these mornings are for us. We have a blast and the girls recognize it as our thing. We eat and we play. We aren’t in a hurry, we order the same thing, and we have some of the funniest conversations. It’s in this environment that I really feel like a dad. It’s a father-daughter experience and it’s part of our foundation.
The girls were dancing away while taking down the Big Breakfast with Hot Cakes. Don’t worry, they burned it off the next hour in the play place!
And I don’t think I’m alone. The funny thing is that I see a lot of dads and grandparents taking kids to McDonald’s. (You actually don’t see too many moms.) There are definitely the regulars and the older couples that have made Saturday morning at McDonald’s their thing for years. It makes sense, I think this was the place to be back in the day before coffee and bagel shops stormed every corner and created a ginormous market for premium coffee. (I mean, they call it a Latte because it costs a Latte and takes a Latte time to make!)
Anyway, I know it won’t be long before the girls grow out of the McDonald’s Play Place and I’m not sure how long this will be a tradition. That is also why I am counting on creating our own thing at home that I wrote about in Why I asked Santa for a Crepe Maker. I think the McDonald’s experience has highlighted that Saturday mornings are the perfect time to connect with the girls (at least until they are teenagers).
P.S. The latte joke was from a Bud Light radio commercial that was part of the Real Men of Genius campaign, where they saluted Mr. Fancy CoffeeShop CoffeePourer
Also, if you are feeling retro, you can see the 1979 McDonald’s commercial below:
How times have changed on how we view fast food from back then to today.
I decided to do a Triathlon this summer and I’ve reverted back to listening to some of my go-to workout music during training. I came across the same album that inspired me to publish an article in Consulting Magazine back in January of 2014 called, Run Your Project like a Rock Concert. At the time, our firm focused on increasing brand awareness and I thought it would be a fun connection to write about.
I truly can’t believe it has already been 5 years since I wrote the article. However, I don’t think a lot has changed in how I approach projects. So I thought I would remix it a little bit and publish it as part of this Mixing Pods blog. I hope you and enjoy it!
In true Mixing Pods form, this is a picture that my friend Jensen Sutta took at a Need to Breathe concert at Red Rocks Amplithether in Morrison, Colorado
Run your Project Like a Rock Concert
By Tony Mauro Jan 7, 2014 (remixed April 2019)
I
was recently on a run listening to one of my favorite live albums, “Alive,” by
Daft Punk. However, this time I found myself not just listening to the music,
but listening to how the crowd responded, the transitions between songs, and
timing of the drops and climaxes. My mind then started wandering to my work,
and I began thinking about the project that I am leading.
Although I would argue that my project isn’t quite as entertaining as a rock concert, I found myself drawing the correlation between the two, and realizing that while partnering with a client, we are putting on an incredible show. It is a large project, spanning a number of months, with numerous stakeholders. My job is to help the ‘artist’ keep the energy going, so that when they go-live, the client is given a standing ovation and asked for an encore.
We commonly use music terms in the workplace, such as Orchestrate, Rhythm, Harmony, and Tempo. But unlike studio singles that are remastered and perfected, leading a major project is like putting on a live concert. No concert is the same, and the artists have to adapt, deal with the elements, and make sure they don’t lose the crowd. On your project you have to make adjustments and improvise, while maintaining scope and keeping stakeholders engaged. Just like a production crew, you have to get the most out of your resources.
Your Project Kickoff
The first song at a show is designed to be exciting and bring the crowd from a state of relaxation to their feet. Your project kickoff meetings and are similar—you need to bring up the energy, get the team excited, and set the tone. If you don’t generate the excitement up front, your team could head for the exits before you get to any of the big hits. Think about the songs that are used at sporting events to get the crowd going between plays or before the puck drops. They have some oomph!
To launch a project successfully, you need to have the right people invited and ensure everyone understands WHY the team is going to tackle the project and their role in its success. Just like the band on stage, you can’t have four lead singers, three lead guitarists, or two drummers on your project. The executive sponsor should be there to fulfill his or her role of showing unwavering support, as well as explaining the relationship between the project and the corporate strategy. Take the time to ensure each person at the kickoff understands how they are going to contribute throughout the entire project. Kickoffs work best at an offsite location, somewhere fresh to get your participants outside of their comfort zone and the grind of the typical business day. Show that the project will be exciting and that the team should be proud of being a part of it.
Have
you ever been to a concert where the crowd was not engaged? In business, we
call this not being aligned with expectations.
I recently heard about a John Mayer show, where he was ripping it up on guitar, and some people said it was unbelievable—but my friend who attended the concert expected to sing along with the songs she knew. Similarly, allowing for team participation in business situations is key to a project’s success. Make sure your team and stakeholders are clear on the project goals and what success looks like. Otherwise, they will disengage and will allocate their time to other initiatives. You want all their attention focused on the project. Can you really do anything else when you are at a rock concert?
Keeping the Team Engaged
A
common complaint you hear in business is one about the lack of communication
among leadership and team members. However, keeping the team engaged in the
project is more than communication; it is really about maintaining the
momentum. Be sure to celebrate mid-term milestones and recognize individual and
team accomplishments. It is also critical to be “real” with the team when
facing current realities and challenges. The audience has their favorite songs
and each person likes different aspects of the show, so utilize a variety of
ways to connect with the team and stakeholders. Lastly, sometimes less is more
and you don’t need to smother participants with communications, but activities
need to be relevant, show progress and be pointed in the right direction.
Preparation
A great concert doesn’t just happen, and an artist doesn’t just walk up to the venue and start rocking out. It takes months of planning by a number of people for a two-hour show from the logistics, marketing, staging and lighting, wardrobe, and so forth. The artists lay out the set list to spread out the popular songs and ensure there is a good flow from start to finish.
Your project will also take months of planning by yourself and others. It takes more than just the project manager to execute a successful project, and you can’t do it alone. There will be discovery, business case analysis, impact assessments, and pre-project planning before you even launch the project. Enlist executive sponsors and ensure all the required functions will provide the resources and time it is really going to require. However, it’s following through on your vision that will be critical. You have to care about it more than anyone.
The
vast majority of popular music follows a verse and chorus structure, with the
repetitive chorus communicating the theme of the song. When artists play live,
they can stop singing and let the crowd take over, because the chorus is always
simple and easy to sing.
This
crowd participation analogy applies to your project. Can your stakeholders
recite your key messages if you were to give them the microphone? The messages
have to be clear, relevant, and compelling enough to get behind. My clients
always requests the most simple and intuitive communications for their teams,
and if the mark is missed, communications are rewritten.
Rhythm and Pace
Even
the most popular bands have to give cues to the crowd, clapping their hands
above their heads, encouraging the audience to join them. The stage crew
flashes the lights on the crowd, prompting them to react. As the project lead,
you also must proactively engage your team members and key stakeholders when
you need them to take an active role and increase participation.
On
the flip side, artists also sprinkle in some softer songs into their set list
and carefully time intermissions. Your project will have quiet times when you
need to regroup and rest in preparation for the next big milestone. It is
important to plan for how you are going to manage the project lulls and
workload intensive times. Celebrate the successes along the way, and give your
team an intermission if required, so they can be more focused in the future.
Van Morrison is the only artist that I am aware of that can get away with just playing the songs on stage and not sharing a story or spending some time talking to the crowd. Your project is also a social outlet; you want your project team and stakeholders to enjoy working on it. Ensure to make time for team outings and opportunities for the team to get to know each other on a personal level. The project team is establishing strong connections and a network that will last long beyond the conclusion of the project.
The Insight
So the next time you have a chance to go to a live show or listen to a live album, pay attention to the crowd. Look at how the artists have organized their setlist, the props they use, and how they are managing the audience. Look around at all the production planning and deliberate structure put in place to make it a good show.
Most importantly, pay close attention to the passion the artist is putting into their craft and think about how you can lead your next project like a rock concert.
There is really no one more genuine than a young child, period! I’m sure everyone reading this blog, especially parents already knew that.
In one of my all-time favorite TED Talks, The 3 A’s of Awesome, Neil Pasricha uses the example of a 3-year-old when talking about attitude, awareness, and authenticity. He urges us to find our inner 3-year-old as we engage the world with curiosity.
Katie and I are fortunate to be in this phase of life with our two girls and it is so much fun. Their expressions are priceless, they say what comes to mind, and they truly use all 5 senses to explore the world.
So in our adventures last weekend, we came across an ice cream shop. (Someone in our family has a serious sweet tooth). It was just a couple of weeks ago that I blogged about exploring joy. Does anything convey joy better than a kid eating ice cream?
Well, our 2-year-old, Addie, didn’t lollygag when it came to choosing the ice cream. She went with her go-to flavor, Chocolate. (must be dad’s influence, my brother-in-law does call me the ‘Chocolate Hammer’).
However, Addie was very clear that she wanted the ‘mermaid cone’ (sugar cone) and passed on the cake and waffle cone options. After a few well-rounded licks of the chocolate ice cream, she flipped it over and dove right into the bottom of the cone.
Beginning with the end in mind
It was funny, but it was also a parental learning moment:
Do we jump in to show the ‘proper way’ to eat the ice cream cone?
Do we intervene so she doesn’t get ice cream on her clothes?
Do we try and explain gravity to a 2-year-old?
Do we get worried about the inevitable mess that is about to be on the table?
Do we try and stop what we know is not going to end well?
or…
Do we just let her go for it?
Eat the cone however you want – It’s half of the experience
Get dirty – We can wash your clothes (and the table and chairs)
Let them stare – Be you girl!
It’s just ice cream – let’s not take ourselves too seriously
But the real the insights go way beyond the ice cream cone. There are life lessons here. If you take a moment and watch a 2-year-old eat an ice cream cone, you will notice:
They are curious
They are happy
They are present
They are focused
They are satisfied
They are not alone
They are not worried about what people think
They are content
Sounds a lot like how I want to live life
They are messy
They sometimes need help
They learn that sometimes it’s too much
They learn that it comes to an end
They learn that scarcity makes it special
They learn that they are fortunate
They learn that it can be taken away
They learn that too much gives them a stomach ache
Sounds a lot like life
Ohh I know this may be taking the ice cream metaphor a bit far. But it did make me (and now you), pause for a minute and think about how something as simple as a kid eating an ice cream cone can be a way to approach our life.
And maybe next time we will get a cup and put the cone on top. Or who knows, maybe just go for the whole bucket.
Don’t worry, she really didn’t eat the whole bucket 🙂
So it’s already March 31st, the last day of the first quarter of the year (dang that went fast!). It’s time for a checkpoint on those goals that we set for the year and how we are doing on that one word for 2019 that we talked about on January 1st.
Commitment. That was my one word for 2019. I also posted a blog in December on why having fun at work would be a top goal in 2019. I’m doing pretty good so far (this blog is still getting posted), and there is always room for more fun.
However, those that know me well (or have picked up on it by reading this blog) know that I am a goal fanatic. I love setting goals, creating sub-goals, grouping goals, prioritizing goals, and talking about goals. I sort of treat personal goals like Wayne Gretzky treated hockey goals.
” You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”Â
Wayne Gretzky
My take is that it costs you nothing to set a goal. So why not put a goal out there if it is something you are thinking about achieving. Goals can be dynamic and might change season to season.
So my 2019 word, commitment, has developed into more of a theme that applies to the goals across 4 categories: Family, Work, Community, and Personal. (Commitment to …)
To measure progress, I take a simple color-based approach to see how I am doing and where to refocus my energy. I score myself as either ‘green’, ‘yellow’, ‘red’, and a new label of ‘blue’.
Green = On Track – Making progress and hitting milestones
Yellow = Need to Recommit – Put more energy and focus on it
Red = Way off Track – Totally Refocus or Evaluate if it was the right goal
Blue = Eliminate = The goal it was DOA (Dead on Arrival)
This past week, I listened to Seth Godin’s, The Dip and he talks about ‘strategic quitting’. So for those goals in red, determining if it is worth persevering get through the dip or if it’s a cul-de-sac, and the goal is a dead end. Should that goal that is in red, be turned to blue? It’s a quick read/listen, so I won’t dive too deep into Seth’s book here, but I highly recommend checking it out.
The good news is tomorrow is April 1st. We have an opportunity to start the next quarter off fresh and it’s a perfect time to do an assessment to determine if you had the right goals to start with or not. How are you doing with that one word you set at the beginning of the year?
Take some time to celebrate your successes and ways to keep the momentum in areas where you are on track. Determine if you need to make some minor adjustments or totally refocus in the areas you aren’t makeing progress. Or lastly, the insight from this blog may be evaluating if it is time to ‘quit’ a goal or think through a word that is a better fit.
There is no need to beat yourself up if you are not on track because no matter how awesome you are, even you can’t change the past. And if you never set a goal in the first place, why not start today? You have nothing to lose.
So my friend Candace Mau hosts a weekly radio show on Mondays called Everyday Joy. It’s a show dedicated to ‘choosing to live a deliberately joyful life!’ She was out of the country this past week with a few members of her extended family and asked me to guest host the show. I just had to open and close the show, and facilitate a Q&A with a guest. She convinced me, I can do this!
Well, I found out a few minutes before the show was going on the air that the guest I was supposed to interview was not going to make it. So I was going solo on the air (it is streamed live) for ~45 minutes or so to talk about joy.
This was a learning experience in so many ways. First, I learned from the producer that I couldn’t have dead air, so I had to just keep talking (kind of like Dory in Finding Nemo… just keep swimming, just keep swimming). I also learned that it is kind of fun to be unscripted. I think that I struggled the most when I was trying to follow something I had jotted down, rather than just speaking from the heart and letting the words flow.
During the first break, the producer helped me figure out the name of the show, Finding Joy Through Connection. I think that was the real gem that came out of this experience. I don’t know if I could have articulated that before we started. However, by talking out loud what joy is to me, how I get it, how I share it, it all just sort of took shape.
I’ve spent hours talking to Candace about similar topics, but I hadn’t ever sat back and organized my thoughts on what truly gives me joy.
Below are some of the key insights that surfaced for me during the show:
Living a joyful life is a choice worth exploring
Asking yourself questions and letting the answers surface is a beautiful process
There is joy in a simple life
Joy doesn’t have boundaries (Socioeconomic, geography, etc.)
Gratitude and connection can get us through anxious moments
Daily dog walks (or just any outdoor walk) allows us time to recharge, connect, and stay grounded
White space is important for me and my family
Self-depreciation is my fasted path to connection
Of course, my family and girls are great sources of joy, I explored this a few months ago in a blog about the day after Maggie was born.
However, the biggest insight for me that won’t surprise many of you reading this blog, is that mixing pods is a great source of joy for me and this blog is a creative outlet. Mixing together my various personas covers most of the items listed above.
How many of you have taken that amount of time to talk through and discover something like what joy means to you? Maybe it’s time for a long car ride, a long walk, or an hour-long radio show. In fact, I think this could be my new approach to discovering more things for myself in the future. Pick a topic and just riff about it, who knows what will surface.
If you would like to listen to the show, you can catch it here. You can also explore Candace’s show, Everyday Joy here.
Joy in long walks and watching the girls try and chase down the Super Worm Equinox Moon on 3/21/19
We had a steady stream of snow storms in Colorado during February, many coming in on the weekend. This meant that on the following Mondays, which are ‘Nani days’ (our girls call my mom Nani), there would be snow on the ground for a snowball battle.
Nani ambush!
These battles take place when we are leaving my parents house, after dinner, when it is dark and cold outside. Temperature doesn’t seem to matter and I think the girls get an adrenaline rush that makes them invisible to the cold.
It only lasts a few minutes, with a few opportunities to reload. I am asked to be the official snowball maker.
So after the initial snowball battle, we had settled into the car seats and I was reversing out of the driveway. The girls were still giggling in the pure joy of ‘winning’ the snowball fight and warming their hands in their blankets.
Nani’s snowball left it’s mark on the window!
Then wham! A snowball bursts across the windshield with a big thud. The girls go quiet for a second, and then Maggie says, “Nani just blasted the car!”. And then another hits the window. This time followed by “Let’s get out of here, Nani is really good at throwing snowballs!”
As I was driving us home, with the girls, the insight for this blog hit me.
Never pass on an opportunity to have a snowball fight with your grandma!
Mixing Pod Insight
These moments in life don’t and won’t happen every day. Embrace them and celebrate them when you can!
